The return of Intershope

For garment trader, Nanak Mehta, it is the beginning of a second innings at retailing. Last week he launched Magiq, a clothing brand for women in Delhi.

Besides ethnic Indian wear, Magiq will also have Indo-Western lines. He has also relaunched Intershope, his store from where he is retailing Magiq.

Intershope, a retail chain, was started in the early 1980s. Over a period of 10 years, the chain had 25 stores across the country. "A few years back we had to scale down our operations and Intershope was more or less defunct as a brand," says Mehta. According to him, both the retailing sector and the Indian consumer were not evolved and Intershope floundered.

But he says times have changed and quotes a commerce ministry survey that said organised retailing, bio-technology, insurance and health care are the growth areas of the Indian economy in the next few years.

Mehta's target consumers are women in the age group of 18-35 years. "Our aim is to provide the office-going women with high-street fashion wear. While the major part of our collection is devoted to salwar-kameez, we also stock T-shirts and capris," he says.

He wants to make Magiq a national brand. Besides his own stores "" he plans to open two more in Delhi and two in the National Capital Region by the year-end "" he also plans to retail from select multi-brand outlets. Also on the anvil are plans to open Intershope in Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Ludhiana and Jaipur.

The reasons for getting into Indian women's ethnic wear are obvious. Though the exact market value for ready-to-wear women's wear is not available, industry estimates put it at around Rs 1,700 crore.

Moreover, there are very few national brands. Magiq's competition will come from TCNS Clothing Company promoted W, Westside and Stop from Shopper's Stop. "The first step is to establish our presence in and around Delhi and then take the brand to other places," says Mehta.

Besides retailing garments, Intershope also has a selection of street jewellery, basket-weave cushions, artefacts and accessories. According to Mehta, these products add "zing value" to shopping.

Intershope has an initial investment of Rs 25 lakh, and the promoter hopes to break even in a couple of years time. The store is owned by Magiq Intershope Pvt Ltd of which Mehta is the chief executive officer.

The holding company of Magiq Intershope is the Mehta group with interests in publishing, printing, garment exports and organising exhibition.